Dead Meat

Terry Allen, the University of Kansas’ fifth-year football coach, lost twenty pounds this summer thanks to the Atkins Diet. That’s where you can eat all the meat you want and still lose weight. Allen could have achieved the same results by taping KU’s 2001 football schedule to his fridge. The Jayhawks will have all the meat they can handle staring at them on the line of scrimmage this season. And this diet is guaranteed to make Allen disappear.

Five teams on the Kansas schedule — Top-25 squads from UCLA, Oklahoma, Kansas State, Nebraska and Texas — all but assure that Coach Allen will be transformed into simply Mr. Allen around Lawrence sometime in late November. UCLA is loaded with talent and has plugged its leaky defense by hiring Arizona State’s defensive wizard, Phil Snow. Oklahoma is coming off a 14-0 national championship season, and some pundits think the team will be even better this year. Kansas State has scored more than 50 points on every Terry Allen-led KU team except his first one — when the Wildcats only scored 48. Nebraska has outscored Allen’s four previous teams 156-34. Add the fact that Colorado, Texas Tech and Iowa State all look like probable bowl teams, and you are quickly down to using Three-Finger Willie’s hand to count the number of possible KU wins.

Allen not only dropped his love handles during the off-season but also lopped off most of the fat on his staff. Seven new assistant football coaches will lead the Jayhawks this autumn. Allen believes the changes are just what the Jayhawks need. “There is no question in my mind that we’ll be a better football team,” he says.

Allen met with the press last week for media day and said lots of gung-ho stuff prior to the team’s initial practice. “We’ll be different than we’ve ever been in the past. I promise you that,” barked Allen, who is 18-27 after four seasons at KU. “We will throw it more, and because of the formations, it will allow us to be more productive rushing.”

He then explained how he and the coaching staff had played video cuts from Remember the Titans for the team. “There were some good scenes in that movie about what leadership is and the responsibility of leadership,” says Allen. He should have rented Liberty Hall and screened Scary Movie 2.

Kansas is not bereft of talent. The Jayhawks possess one of the finest receiving corps in the Big 12. Harrison Hill, the senior co-captain and coverboy for the team’s pocket schedule, was honorable mention All-Big 12 last season at wide receiver. Barring injury, Hill will finish his career at KU as the school’s leading receiver. If Allen could clone the 5-foot-11 Hill and his ultra-competitive nature, he’d never have to worry about job security. “Everything is different this year,” says Hill. “They brought in great coaches — coaches who have installed discipline into this team. We haven’t had discipline in the past. That’s why we haven’t been consistent. That’s why we lose games to SMU and almost beat Oklahoma.”

Kansas’ talent has been good enough at times during Allen’s reign to scare the hell out of Texas A&M, Nebraska and Oklahoma for three and a half quarters. None of those close losses has been titillating enough to entice KU fans to embrace football as eagerly as Allen Bohl, KU’s new athletic director, says it must be. “Over the next decade, we’re going to make a difference in all our athletics, but especially in football,” Bohl says. “Football means so much to our entire athletic program.”

What a successful football program means to any university is money — lots of money to fund non-revenue-producing sports. “The reality of the situation is we need [to win this year] for our athletic program,” Allen says.

Bohl promises to fill Memorial Stadium seven times this year with 51,000 paying customers. Unfortunately, his promotional plans are as worn out as Bob Frederick’s hairline. Bohl brags that Roy Williams and his basketball players will form a human chute for the football players to run through for the season opener. He plans to have church choirs sing the national anthem at all home games to boost the attendance head count. Bohl sounds like a nice guy from Fresno State via Toledo who might just be out of his league. Which is a feeling Terry Allen and the Jayhawks can probably relate to.